PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MEN TELL NO TALES

Welcome to the fifth — and, Davy Jones willing, the last — installment of this franchise: “Pirates of the Caribbean: Johnny Depp Is Bad With Money.”

It’s a little less cute these days to watch his Jack Sparrow swish about drunkenly, knowing the actor’s been accused of being an abusive lush. Equally wearisome is the spectacle of a once-entertaining franchise staggering around, devoid of purpose.

Like most sequels attempting to justify their existence, this one throws in a mind-numbingly large cast of characters. One does stand out, though: Javier Bardem’s Captain Salazar, a cursed seafarer with an uncanny resemblance to a bloated, middle-aged Edward Scissorhands. (If this is a costume designer’s snarky wink, well played, ma’am or sir.)

Bardem’s clanky villain is on a revenge quest to find Jack, who is himself on a quest for this chapter’s magical totem, the trident of Poseidon, at the urging of Henry Turner (Brenton Thwaites), son of the original’s Will (Orlando Bloom).

Will is now cursed to live forever on the sunken Flying Dutchman. Still with me? They’re accompanied by Carina (Kaya Scodelario), a young scientist who’s been persecuted as a witch (the movie gets an undue amount of mileage out of pirates leeringly misunderstanding her saying she’s a “horologist”). And they’re all pursued by Geoffrey Rush’s Captain Barbossa (yarrr, that Rush does some first-rate scenery-chewin’) and a fleet of snotty, indistinguishable British soldiers.

Javier Bardem as Captain Salazar is one of the few standout performances.

“Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales” attempts to wear down its doubters through sheer volume, braying the signature theme song ever louder with each of Captain Jack’s tiresome high jinks (for a weathered seafarer, even a drunk one, he’s awfully bad at keeping his limbs out of a ship’s ropes).

It’s also grittier than previous chapters, full of men being run through with swords, severed heads, dripping blood and ships on fire surrounded by floating dead bodies; directors Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg seem inspired less by an amusement park ride than by “Game of Thrones.”

The violence is realistic enough to be too scary for kids, with an ADD plot that’ll be off-putting to anyone over 10. That makes for a mighty slim target demographic — none of whom will likely appreciate a cameo from Paul McCartney, amusingly pirated up and cracking bad jokes from a dungeon cell.

If being dull, gruesome and obnoxiously loud weren’t enough, “Dead Men Tell No Tales” makes sure to get in a blast of sexism, too, as Jack’s nearly forced to marry a homely woman. But the real ugliness here is sheer Hollywood greed — which, like a crew of cursed skeleton pirates, seems destined to live on forever.